


Both Fowl and Fair

by MistressOfDarkMagic



Category: Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
Genre: Gen, Inspired by Frozen (2013)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-19
Updated: 2017-09-14
Packaged: 2018-08-23 10:45:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8324791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressOfDarkMagic/pseuds/MistressOfDarkMagic
Summary: At the tender age of 8, Artemis vowed to never let his emotions get away from him, to never feel so much he would put people in danger. To never use his powers if not absolutely necessary. And so he did, banishing his emotions from his heart and incasing himself in armor made of ice.





	1. Part 1

If Artemis were to be summed up in one word, it would probably be "ice". From his demeanor to his personality to his appearance, everything about him was icy. The coldness with which he treated all that attempted to come close (and even those who already were), his slick process of thought and cool logical nature, and the shade of his large deep blue eyes. He was ice incarnated into flesh; slippery, deceiving, sharp as a razor, and dangerous in every sense of the word.

But there was another reason, a secret Artemis had buried deep within himself and never (always) allowed to overcome him.

Ever since he was born, there had been something strange about Artemis. He never got cold (often kicking away blankets even in the dead of winter), and was often scolded for sneaking away to play in the snow, or, if such weather was unavailable, inside the walk-in fridge. Artemis seemed to feed off of coldness, and when he was 3 years old, his parents finally got some answers why.

He had been fiddling with the parts of various kitchen devices he had disassembled, when his parents had walked in and discovered the small toddler among the dangerous clutter with a screwdriver in his chubby hand. Immediately marching over and pulling him out of the wreckage, his mother went on to berate him for being so reckless and handling such dangerous equipment, while his father knelt down and began trying to puzzle out what exactly it was Artemis had done to the blender.

Naturally, Artemis didn't think he had done anything wrong. He saw himself as perfectly capable of handling such tools without injuring himself, despite his age, and his parents had always encouraged his curiosity and intelligence. Why should they be angry with him now?

Growing ever more and more frustrated with his mother, his short temper finally reached an end.

"Enough!" He shouted (well, squeaked is probably more accurate). He stomped his foot in annoyance, and to his eternal shock, ice began to freeze over the floor, emanating from the point where his sock-clad foot had touched the ground.

To say his parents and Artemis himself were stunned is an understatement. They were completely thunderstruck by the appearance of the ice that now formed a small circle around the raven-haired child. Artemis Sr. stuttered away facts and expressions of disbelief, scrambling for some sort of explanation. Mrs. Fowl immediately scooped her son into her arms, well away from the frozen patch of tile, and turned him away from the site, bouncing the toddler up and down and running her fingers through his hair as if he were a frightened child in need of comfort.

But, Artemis wasn't scared, nor was he convinced by his father's attempt to use logic to explain away the phenomenon. Logically, there was only one explanation, and that was that Artemis himself had caused the ice to appear. And that left Artemis awestruck.

Over the next few years, Artemis would continue to experiment (both intentionally and un-) with his power. He learned that he was capable of creating both ice and snow, and that his powers reacted to his emotions, most specifically anger and fear. Unfortunately, it seemed that the more emotional he was, the stronger his powers became, and the harder it was to control him. In fact, more than once his anger had gotten away from him, and his powers accidently covered everything in the room in a thick layer of ice.

Such incidents terrified Artemis; it was a miracle that no one had gotten hurt during one of his episodes. The next time, he may not be so lucky. He could hurt someone, or even kill them, someone he cared about. He could not - would not allow that to happen. At the tender age of 8, Artemis vowed to never let his emotions get away from him, to never feel so much he would put people in danger. To never use his powers if not absolutely necessary. And so he did, banishing his emotions from his heart and incasing himself in armor made of ice.

* * *

 

_Russia_

Absolutely frigid air swirled around the small group of people - two humans (more or less), and two fairies (elves to be precise). Yet all Artemis felt was a sense of terror and guilt. He hadn't meant to hurt Holly, hadn't meant to steal her magic. No matter what the commander said, it had been an accident. He was clumsy when it came to physical tasks in the best of conditions. Asking him to drag a fully grown active-duty Recon captain into a moving train that was oozing radiation in the dead of a Russian winter? Even with his resistance to the cold, the task had taken every ounce of strength he had. He certainly had nothing left to deal with where he landed as he passed out from shock and trauma, and his body could not resist the magic that was being offered so freely.

But, he had done it. He had taken away the chance for Holly to regain her severed finger, after she had been in the situation only because she was helping him rescue his father. It was his fault. All his fault.

Something familiar stirred in his gut, and he stiffened. No, no, not now. Now was the worst possible time. But his power wasn't listening. The floor of the train was instantly covered in frosted ice, and the walls were well on their way to being the same way.

"What the -" Root began.

"Artemis, calm down." Butler immediately stood in front of the commander and the defenseless form of Captain Short. "You won't help anyone by freezing the wheels of the train."

He was right. If his ice got to the undercarriage and froze the axels and wheels . . . Artemis could only too clearly picture the consequences.

"I'm trying to control it." Artemis snapped, squeezing his hands into fists. "Lately, though, it's been getting stronger."

"What - D'Arvit." Root swore. "You're doing this, Fowl?"

"Not on purpose." Artemis closed his eyes and released a deep breath. "Emotion triggers it. Excuse me." He got up from where he was half-crouched on the floor and moved to the slightly open door. He took another breath and held his hands up, gathering the storm of guilt and ice into a metaphorical ball, then pushed it out.

A compact stream of ice and snow flowed violently from his hands and out into the snow-covered countryside, visibly carving a path of white snow and debris alongside the train. Artemis forced the overflow out, pushing harder and harder until he felt like he wasn't about to explode from the pressure of the power raging inside him. He slowed the pace of the ice stream until it petered out, then bowed his head in slight exhaustion. Crude, but the most effective way of making sure that his pent-up power didn't go absolutely crazy when it chanced upon an opening it could use to escape.

"I - apologize." Artemis said shortly. "Usually I can keep it under control, but -" Artemis cut himself off as an idea hit him. "Commander, how long has it been since Holly was injured?"

"Two minutes." Root said shortly. "Even if we could muster up the magic, by the time we did so, it would be too late. And you are going to explain what the D'Arvit you just did!" He shouted.

"Not now, Commander." Artemis knelt next to Holly's still frame.

"Artemis . . . " Butler rumbled.

"I am fine now, old friend." Artemis waved off the large mans concern. "I have just enough power left -" he picked up Holly's maimed hand and gently ran his own over it, coating it in frost and ice, "-to save Holly's finger. Commander, lend me the digit?"

Root fumed. "What do you think you're doing, Mud Boy?!"

"Saving Holly's trigger finger and career. Now hand me the finger." Artemis said frostily, using his very best death glare. Root glared right back, but held out the finger for Artemis to freeze.

As he did so, he explained. "I am freezing the wound and the digit so that when Holly is exposed to healing magic, her body will see this as a recent wound, and proceed to accept the changes."

"And where are we going to find healing magic out here?" Root asked, thoroughly unimpressed with Artemis' seemingly flawed plan.

"We're going to preform the Ritual." Artemis said simply, reaching around Holly's neck and pulling a chain from beneath her suit, a chain that held a golden copy of the Book, and a small sealed capsule filled with brown earth.

* * *

 

 After the intense experience of watching Holly go through the Ritual and heal a minutes-old wound, the four decided it would be best to return to the shuttleport to regroup and plan what to do next. Holly made this trip on Butler's shoulder, a fact she protested until her commander told her, in no uncertain terms, that she had no business moving immediately after major magical surgery that by all accounts should not have worked, and to shut up and do her hand exercises to make sure everything reconnected properly.

"Commander, may I have a private word with you?" Artemis requested. The Commander glared, but nodded, and their pace slowed so that they walked a good 5 yards behind Holly and Butler.

"This had better be about the stunt you pulled on the train."

"It is, and I have a - favor to ask of you."

"A favor?" Root repeated warily. "Not likely, Fowl."

"I wish for you to keep my ability to yourself." Artemis continued, ignoring the commanders words. "I do not wish for it to become common knowledge, and frankly, it won't hurt you or the People to be close-lipped about this subject at this time."

"How did you do it?" Root changed the topic.

"I was born with the power." Artemis answered truthfully. "But that is all I shall tell you unless you agree to leave this out of your report to the Council."

"Give me one good reason why I should."

"I cannot." Artemis shrugged. "Only that there is no risk in keeping this information to yourself until it is needed. I do not plan on being a threat to the People ever again -" Root snorted, "- but if that time ever does come, you can simply reveal my ability then. To a certain extent, I trust you and Captain Short not to abuse this information without just cause, but you have a leak - don't even bother denying it, the goblin hit squad is evidence enough - and any enemy would not be as noble about using the knowledge of my capabilities."

When Root thought about it, it wasn't a totally unreasonable request. If he were in Fowl's boots, he would probably ask the same thing.

"If I agree, what will you give me in return?" Root asked.

"If you agree not to inform any of the People about my power without just cause, including Captain Short and Mr. Foaly, I will tell you everything I know about it as of today."

Root thought about it, then held out his hand in a reluctant gesture. "Deal." He grounded out.

Artemis took the hand, and shook it firmly. "Thank you, Commander."

"Now spill."

Artemis raised a delicate eyebrow at the phrasing, but proceeded to do so.

"I was born with the ability, as I said before. I am capable of creating ice, snow, and frost, despite the weather, and to my knowledge it all melts at a natural rate for the temperature. I am unaffected by the cold, but not comfortable in extreme heat. My powers appear to be triggered by strong emotion. I can of course control them, calling them up if needed, but if I am, say, feeling angry, my powers will increase in strength and therefore be harder to control, sometimes lashing out without my direction, as you saw on the train."

"And do you have any idea why?" The commander questioned.

"Well, I assume that that means my power is at least partially controlled by the amygdala -"

"Why you have powers." Root cut off what promised to be a long and drawn out rant about neuroscience.

"No, I do not." Artemis admitted slightly sullenly, avoiding the commanders gaze. "According to DNA tests, I am completely human, and I haven't found any differences that can not be explained between the general population's genetics and my own. I have simply learned to accept the fact and do my best to control it."

Root nodded. By this time, they had nearly reached the shuttleport, and there was nothing left to say. The two caught up with Butler and Holly, and began to deduce what was happening down in Haven.

* * *

 

_London_

It was like a scene from a B-list horror movie; bodies and blood splayed across every wall and corner of the almost mockingly elegant room. Shattered glass and overturned tables littered the floor, and the moans of the barely conscious echoed in the air. Artemis ignored this all though, having eyes only for the man who laid before his kneeling form.

"Butler . . ." He whispered, a lump in his throat and burning in his eyes preventing a louder tone. Breath rattled in Butler's chest, but it was weak, and every intake seemed to take longer to form than the last.

Then the breathing stopped.

"No . . ." Artemis shook his head, desperate tears finally breaking through his desperate emotional barrier.

"NO!" He roared. Jagged icicles rose up from the floor, encircling the boy and the body, bluntly knocking aside any one who was in the way and not caring if they went through instead of around someone. Screams bashed at Artemis' eardrums, but he didn't hear them.

The temperature dropped instantaneously, and the very air froze, specks of pulverized ice getting caught and hanging suspended in the air. Wind swirled around him, a fearsome beast of frigid snow and ice in the form of a frozen tornado, and it tore apart the debris and anything that wasn't bolted down or cemented into place - or anyone.

The power amassed at his hands, and almost on auto pilot, the ice and frost released, and traveled across Butler's body, flash freezing the Eurasian man.

Artemis was still screaming, but no words were coming out. Instead it was a torrent of anguish, of noise and pain. Ice streaked down his cheeks, tears frozen moments after leaving his eye sockets, and razorblades were clawing at the inside of his throat. The ice and wind and snow grew stronger and stronger until the walls could take it no more, and came crashing down, exposing all of London to the anger and grief of Artemis Fowl.

* * *

 

_Haven_

Holly was the last captain to make it to the LEP situation room in Police Plaza. Her non-regulation vehicle had not received the extra minutes of energy required to make it from the field back to base, or the juice to keep the goblins she was transporting locked up, so she had been forced to deal with that before being able to make for headquarters.

Holly sank into her assigned seat after some berating of her lateness (sexist pig, she thought darkly), and Foaly stepped forward, an armful of disks cradled against his body and one of the most worried faces she had ever seen the centaur pull. He gently dumped the load onto a table with a computer terminal, then cleared his throat to speak.

"Today, two things happened that made me advise the Council to place us on lockdown." Foaly expertly loaded one of the discs, and complex algorithms, charts, and intersecting lines flashed on the screen.

The room was silent for perhaps half a minute, before Commander Root said what everyone in the room was thinking.

"I think I'm speaking for the whole room here, Foaly, when I say that all I see is lines and squiggles. Doubtless it makes sense to a smart pony like yourself, but the rest of us are going to need some plain Gnommish."

Foaly sighed. "Simply put, really simply, we got pinged. Is that plain enough?"

It was. The fear was audible even in the stunned silence.

Root was the first to recover his voice. "Pinged. Who pinged us?"

Foaly shrugged. "Don't know. It only lasted a few seconds. There was not recognizable signature, and it was untraceable."

"What did they get?"

"Quite a bit. Everything North European. Scopes, Sentinel, all of our cam-cams. Downloaded information on every single one of them. My security encryptions folded like they weren't even there."

Holly swallowed nervously. Someone somewhere knew everything about the People in Northern Europe. They could expose their civilization to the entire world. Haven would cease to be one, and the People would be shoved under a microscope in some Mud Man's lab.

But even with this major bombshell to wreck havoc in her brain, something else nagged at Holly's mind.

"Foaly, you said you had two reasons to call the lockdown. What's the second?" Holly asked.

For once, Foaly turned wordlessly back to the computer and furiously typed against the holographic keyboard, bringing up two new windows, one showing a live Mud Man news channel broadcast, and the other a real-time satellite feed, both showing the same thing.

"I trust I don't have to dumb this one down."

In the background, Holly could pick out Buckingham Palace and Big Ben, landmarks even fairies could recognize and pin the location as London. That was about all Holly could see of the famous city, though, because the rest of the frames were dominated by a giant white streak that seemed to be moving.

A few seconds of staring later, Holly began to make out more details about just what it was that she was seeing. A tower of white ice was sitting in the smack dab middle of London, sharp offshoots slicing out like blades on all sides and twisting round and round. Wind was breaking off bits and pieces of the horrible structure and blowing the debris around in circles, giving the appearance that the white was moving.

"Foaly?" Captain Trouble Kelp asked in a hushed voice. "What is that?"

"Ice. Past that, I have no idea. It started appearing about half an hour, and has been growing larger and the wind you can see around it stronger ever since. 150 confirmed deaths, and countless others injured or missing. The Mud Men have no clue what's happening, and unfortunately we don't know much more, only the rough area of London where the phenomenon started. The kicker? The ping also originated in London, and only about ten minutes before the ice storm did."

"You think the two events are connected." A councilmember said.

"No such thing as coincidence." Foaly nodded.

"And I have a suspect." Root sighed.

All eyes in the room turned to the elf.

"Commander?" Holly asked.

"Artemis Fowl." The only two words the Commander needed to send the entire room into a flurry of voices. No one sentence could be distinguished from another, and this mish-mash of opinions went on for a good 3 minutes.

"SHUT UP!" Root shouted. The LEP officials fell quiet.

"Commander?" Holly resisted the urge to raise her hands like an elfling in primary school. "With all due respect, Fowl might be a criminal, but he's not a murderer, and we ended contact on decent terms last time. It doesn't seem likely he's behind this."

"I didn't say he was doing it on purpose." Root noted the confused stares and resigned himself to coming clean. "When Fowl, Butler, Captain Short, and myself were on a mission in the Artic Circle, Short's finger was cut clean off in an accident. Her magic had accidently been siphoned away, and I didn't have enough to perform the healing myself."

"But you managed to complete the Ritual in time and reattach my finger." Holly finished what she thought was the story, but Root shook his head.

"By the time we performed the Ritual, it had been almost 8 minutes since the injury."

"But that's not possible!" Another councilmember called out.

"A healing has to take place in under four minutes." Holly nodded, frowning.

"Unless the wound is frozen, apparently." Root snorted. "When I confronted Fowl about the injury, he said he had blacked out, and had no intention of robbing you of his magic. He nearly collapsed again, and suddenly the interior of the train car was covered in ice."

"Ice?!"

"That's not possible!"

"But it happened, so be quiet and let me finish the report!" Root snapped. The two interjectors fell silent.

"As I was saying, the interior of the car froze. Butler and Fowl didn't seemed surprised by this, Butler just told the Mud Boy to calm down. Fowl proceeded to stand up, walk to the door, and shot enough ice and snow out of his hands to turn a desert into a winter wonderland."

Murmuring bubbled among the majors and captains and council.

"Are you saying that Fowl . . . has some kind of ice magic?" Foaly asked skeptically.

Root waved his hand. "If that's what you want to call it. Fowl then used the power he had left to freeze Holly's wound and trick her body into thinking only 2 minutes had passed instead of 8."

"And why were we not informed that the Fowl boy had . . . mutant abilities," the Council Chairman chose his words carefully, "in your report?"

"Fowl and I made a deal. He would tell me what he knew about his abilities if I kept it to myself for the time being." Root shrugged. "We had a leak, and the Mud Boy knew it. Seeing as I could reveal the information at any time if it became pertinent, such as now, I agreed to his terms."

"So what exactly are the extents of the Mud Boy's abilities?" Wing Commander Vinyaya inquired.

"He deals in frost, ice, and snow, and it all melts naturally. He was born with it, and doesn't know why. He can control it when he wants to, but according to him, it's also connected to his emotions, and if they get out of control, then so do his powers."

"You think Artemis has lost control." Holly concluded.

"You were right earlier. Artemis is a criminal, but he's a thief, not a killer. He's also a lurk-in-the-shadows kind of person. Pulling this kind of stunt would get him nothing but high profile scrutiny."

"So what do we do?" Holly asked.

"You, Captain Short, are going to get wings and a weapon and commandeer a supersonic shuttle to the surface. Artemis is most familiar with you, so you stand the best chance at getting to him. Foaly, you prove that we give that budget for a reason and make sure Holly knows where she's going and doesn't get killed along the way. The rest of you - " The commander raised his voice at his subordinate officers, " - will deal with the chaos of the lockdown."

"Should we be taken off lockdown?" Captain Kelp asked.

"No." Vinyaya answered. "We don't know for sure that Fowl was behind the ping, and if he wasn't, going off lockdown will only give our intruder more data."

"Well, what are you all just sitting there for?" The commander barked. "GET MOVING!"

* * *

 

_England_

An hour later, Holly was flying over English land, soaring as fast as she possibly could towards London from the Stonehenge terminal. The ride up had been quick, even by fairy standards, but every second had seemed like one too many. Every second that passed meant Artemis was destroying even more of London and hurting more people, and would only have that much more guilt to deal with.

And Holly didn't doubt Artemis would feel guilty. Processing what Root had told her about Artemis' gift, his completely indifferent and cold (pun not intended) exterior now made startling sense. If an emotional response could set off such a devastating power, the only thing to be done would be to make sure that his emotions never got out of his control. Artemis Fowl wasn't heartless; he simply couldn't allow his heart to speak for him.

That child with the blank face that had terrified her for months after meeting (no child should ever be that expressionless; ever), that child was not real. It was a front built to protect the world from the real boy inside. Who that boy was, Holly did not know, but it was someone who could feel guilt and empathy and had some sense of ethics, skewed as they might be. Which was why she needed to get to Artemis as quickly as possible, before he realized what he was doing to London and his emotions spiraled even further out of his control. Assuming, that is, he hadn't already. But Foaly hadn't reported the epicenter of the storm moving or spiking exponentially in intensity in any of the rambling updates the centaur was babbling into her ear, so that probably meant that Artemis hadn't moved either.

She felt the chill long before she saw the ice. It was invasive, working its way beneath her suit and helmet and freezing her skin. She activated the heating coils, but even though they let her very uniform radiate heat that should have made her feel like she had slipped into a slime bath, she only felt like she was frozen.

The wind whipped around her slim frame, and she had to push her wings to the limit to keep in air and flying straight. It was almost like a physical force pushing her, like knives being thrown at her body trying to tear through her, or waves slamming her into the surface. A couple of times she did lose control, and the tumble backwards before she regained balance was exactly like getting knocked down in the ocean.

London finally came into view, and even though she had seen the footage, the sight was devastating to see in person, nearly causing Holly to halt in midair (which she managed to not do, to avoid being knocked out of the sky).

A great pillar of ice and debris stretched from the center of London into the sky, buildings pushed aside like building blocks and great chunks of concrete being tossed around like leaves. The wind's howl was greater than anything Holly had heard before, the sound of a beast far more horrifying than the trolls that lived in the tunnels below or the machines the Mud Men used above.

Artemis was somewhere in that, was the cause of that. Just barely pushing forward and dodging the car-sized hunks of ice being torn away and thrown her direction, it hit Holly just how much power Artemis had at his fingertips, how much power was unintentionally being used and how destructive it was without a leash to restrain it. Yet in his thirteen years of living, he had managed to hold it back instead of using it for his own gain. Another insight into the boy beneath the ice.

It soon became explicitly clear that there would be no way to fly to the center of this mess; there was simply too much debris and wind to hold a course without being knocked out of the sky. Holly used her helmet to pinpoint a spot at least partially shielded from the wind, and gratefully (but carefully) landed on the ground, sheltering as best as she could and updating Foaly on her status.

"There's no way I can fly in this; heading in on the ground." She bit out into her helmet, pulling out her Neutrino and kicking it up to its highest level, certain that it would be needed in the landscape of ice.

"Good call; the amount of concrete and steel and who knows what else my sensors are picking up in that storm is equivalent to more than a few skyscrapers. I doubt there's anyone still in that area that can talk about seeing you, so feel free to stop shielding and save your magic."

Holly did, bitterly aware that Foaly was right; anyone still in the area wouldn't be able to talk, because they were most likely dead.

A flashing map on the screen showed a street view of London, with a blinking red light to show where Artemis was supposed to be, and a green beacon to represent her. In theory, getting from point A to point B was simple. All she had to do was follow the map and duck the occasional hunk of concrete being chucked at her head. In reality, however, things were a bit more complicated. For one thing, the map she was following was of London pre-Artemis.

"D'Arvit, Foaly!" She shouted after the third time she was forced to turn around after being faced with an insurmountable (and un-blast-able) wall of debris. "Why are you giving me a map only useful in pointing out what London used to like?!"

"It's the newest one I have!" Foaly defended. "I've got satellites pointed at the city, but it's next to impossible to get much of anything through this storm. You're lucky I can still keep track of you in all this!"

Holly sighed, but continued on, having no choice in the matter but to improvise her way to the epicenter of the storm.

Holly's boots crunched on the black-streaked iced that coated the ground. The wind shrieked around her ears, pounding at her helmet and often blinding her. More than a few times, the treads on her shoes failed to create traction, and she went stumbling to the ground. The wind immediately covered her in snow, and the ice on the ground did its best to pierce through her suit. Every time this happened, Holly pushed herself back onto her feet, but every time, the cold invading her bones made it harder to do so. It was almost like a living force, doing everything it could to bring Holly to her knees.

Finally, finally, after hours of battling the intense wind, Holly reached a destroyed shell of a building that Foaly's scanners indicated Artemis was inside. The remains of a sign iced into the ground suggested it was some kind of restaurant. Razor sharp icicles the size of oak trees jutted out of the remains of the cinderblock walls colored an odd reddish-brown color that Holly didn't want to think about. The wind was the strongest here, Holly having to turn on the propulsion in her wings on low just to remain standing. Every opening was blocked by a thick layer of ice, making the ruins a veritable fortress.

Holly planted her feet, then aimed her gun at one of the openings in the corner of the building, judging it the least likely spot to have Artemis with range of it. Quickly, Holly shot off two quick bursts into the ice. Pulverized frost and snow broke off from the impact site, but Holly was dismayed to see the ice had not shattered. Again and again, Holly kept firing off shots at the thick wall of ice. Little by little, she chipped away at the potent mixture of snow, frost, and ice, until finally she managed to break through, a small opening barely large enough for a cat. Encouraged, she slid up to the opening, and used a long, consistent beam to melt away the edges until she had an opening large enough for her to squeeze through. Toning down the setting on her neutrino, she slipped inside.

The first thing that happened when she slipped inside was her falling flat on her face. Outside with the wind raging, propulsion from her wings had been required to move forward and stand. In here, though, the air was motionless and almost oppressively silent, like the air itself was frozen. With this sudden lack of resistance, Holly's wings became less than useless, and caused her to crash into the ground. Muttering curses, Holly turned off the wings and picked herself up, only to come face to face with a dead body.

Now this was not Holly's first body. Murder and suicide were rare among fairies, but it did happen, and Holly had had to prove she could handle the possibility of death to make it as far up the ranks as she had. Bodies were nothing new, but this one . . . The first thing an onlooker would notice was the cause of death. Even a goblin could have told you what that was, and it was the jagged icicle that had punched a watermelon sized hole in the Mud Man's stomach, nearly ripping the body in two. Blood stained the otherwise pure white ice, and froze into their own icicles and trails along the body. The man's face was twisted in agony, an empty scream frozen before it could escape his lips. Drool and blood marred the mouth and pale blue skin of the chin, and the man's eyes stared lifelessly at nothing. The whole thing was coated with a thin layer of ice that unfortunately did nothing to distort the details of the body.

To her credit, Holly didn't scream. The breath was drawn but never released. Instead a wave of nausea forced Holly to close her eyes and kneel. Opening the visor to puke was not an option, so Holly resulted to calming breathes while waiting for her stomach to stop churning. Reasonably certain she wouldn't hurl, Holy stood back up, and resolutely ignoring the dead Mud Man, turned her gaze to the rest of the room.

She had been correct in thinking this place a restaurant. At one time, it had been a pricy place with elegance draping from every feature. Wine glasses with mixtures from the French Revolution, fish from the Channel caught only hours before, silk tablecloths on every table, precisely the kind of place Holly would expect Artemis to dine at.

There were more bodies strewn around the large room. Tossed against crumbling walls and flung onto tables, long lumps rose in the ice layer that covered and buried the walls and floor. Holly did not focus on them too intensely. At least, not until one of the lumps moved.

Catching the movement out of the corner of her eye, Holly quickly snapped back her gaze and prepared her magic. If it was a Mud Man who had somehow survived this devastation, she wanted to be ready to heal. She slowly crept to the lump that had caught her eye. It was different than the other bodies. Whereas every other body in the room was spread eagle or lying on its side, this one was hunched, crouched over another lump. As Holly watched and approached, she saw it move again, shuddering and heaving. She became aware of the smallest of noises, a hiccupping sound intermingled with the occasional gasp. Scooting towards the front of the figure, Holly saw that it was not actually a survivor. It was Artemis himself.

She nearly didn't recognize him. His clothes were cover in layers of patterned ice that crack and reformed over and over again as he shifted. Frost clung to his hair, making it appear swirled with white where the frost was thick and gray where it was thin. His skin was tinged blue, and on anyone else she would have said they had frostbite. Thick tears rolled down his cheeks only to freeze in their tracks before the buildup grew too heavy and broke off. His hands were uselessly pawing at an abnormally large lump in ice, and as Holly squinted her eyes, she could make out enough details of the face to realize that it was Butler frozen beneath Artemis's hands.

"Oh, Frond." Holly whispered.

"Holly?" Foaly whinnied over the mic, hearing Holly's voice after the hours of silence he left her to focus on crossing London. "What's going on? Have you found Fowl?"

Holly blinked. "Yeah, I found him. It's like the eye of the hurricane in here, but - oh Frond, Foaly, something happened to Butler."

"Butler? What? What happened?" Foaly's voice was confused, as if he couldn't imagine anything happening to the giant Mud Man. Holly had to admit she felt the same way. She hadn't even thought about how Butler could have let Artemis get so out of control.

"I don't know; I'm too far away to see clearly. He's frozen, but I have no idea if that's the cause of this or an aftereffect of the trigger."

"Can you get close enough to make out what happened?"

Holly took a breath. "That would involve approaching Artemis; I haven't done that yet."

"Smart choice." The commander's voice came over the mic. "There's no telling what might happen if you go over there. He might realize what he's doing, and if he does -"

"Another breakdown and an even larger storm." Holly finished grimly. "One that makes this one look like a flurry."

"Should you shoot him? Stop his emotions, stop the storm." Root pointed out.

"Yeah, and let gravity take care of the tons of debris the storm is throwing around." Foaly said sarcastically. "No, we need Artemis to let the storm dissolve."

"Mesmer?"

"No eye contact yet, and I don't think even mesmer could stop Artemis from feeling all this."

"A tranq, then." Holly suggested. "Slow down his system so the storm gets weaker as he does."

There was a pause over the line.

"Sounds like the best option." Foaly remarked.

"You mean our only option." Root commented grimly.

Holly swallowed. "I'm going in now. Setting my visor to transparent and muting your line." Holly made the necessary adjustments so that Artemis would be able to see her face and hear her, then reached into her belt, pulling out an adhesive patch soaked in enough sedatives to knock out a troll.

She took the final few steps towards Artemis, and took a deep breath. "Artemis?" She called softly.

The effect was instantaneous. Artemis whirled around, nearly toppling over back onto Butler's lifeless form. His wide blue eyes were stark against the deathly pale background of his face, and the tears still welling up inside them glistened in the soft light reflected from Holly's helmet on the ice.

"Holly?" He croaked. "Captain Short?" He corrected. "What - what are you doing here?"

"I'm here to help you, Artemis." Holly said gently.

"Help me? I - I don't understand." Artemis shook his head, as if trying to clear it. The exact opposite of what Holly wanted to happen.

"You're dreaming." She blurted. "Having a nightmare." That may not have been a psychologist-approved response, but Holly would rather deal with a little extra fallout later than deal with any of it now.

"Dreaming?" Artemis frowned. "It doesn't feel like -"

"Of course you're dreaming!" Holly pushed. "I'm here to wake you up."

"Really?" Artemis's voice was small, and Holly could see his eyes darting around the room, growing wider and wider as he took in the details of his surroundings. Outside, the wind started to pick up, and Holly knew that what Artemis had done was beginning to dawn on him. She had to act fast.

"Take my hand." She held out the hand that had the sedative patch concealed in it. "Artemis, please. If you want to wake up, take my hand."

"I-" Artemis hesitated, fear growing in his blue orbs. "Did I do this?" He whispered.

"No." Holly shook her head. "It's just a nightmare. Artemis, take my hand."

Artemis's hand shook heavily, but he reached it out, and clasped her hand tightly. He immediately began to sway, and Holly could hear the roar of the wind start to dim slightly. It was working for now, but how long before Artemis and the storm faded out completely?

"Holly?" Artemis called, voice confused and sluggish.

"It's fine." Holly insisted. "You'll be waking up in a moment, I promise." Well, it should feel like a moment for him. Holly pulled out a Moon Belt and cam foil, and before Artemis could comment, fastened the Belt around Artemis's waist.

"What -" Artemis blinked slowly, and his knees began to buckle. At his now greatly reduced weight, Holly was able to catch him before he hit the ground.

Artemis was falling into drugged sleep fast, but before he fell completely, he muttered one thing. "This isn't a dream." It was not a question.

Holly shook her head. "I'm sorry." She whispered.

Artemis looked like he wanted to say more, but his eyelids and mouth had grown heavy, too heavy to move.

"Sleep, Artemis." Holly layered her voice with the barest layer of mesmer.

And he did.


	2. Part 2

"Commander, Foaly, I have Artemis. He's out of it, and the storm sounds like it's dying." Holly spoke into her mic. She laid Artemis limply on the frozen floor and began to rub at the ice encasing Butler's body. A swipe of her hand over his chest revealed a bullet wound ringed with blood, and Holly hissed silently.

"Butler was shot." Her voice hung, struggling to be flat but ultimately failing. Butler had been a good man, and a friend to the People. "That's what set Artemis off." It made sense. Artemis Fowl Sr. had been lost when Artemis was 10, and may not have been around much before that; Angeline Fowl succumbed to mental illness not long after that. For over 2 years Butler would have been the closest thing Artemis had to a parent, the only one to turn to when his powers threatened to break free or when he simply needed an adult presence. Losing him must be unimaginable for the 13 year-old.

Vaguely, Holly wondered if Artemis had gotten the killer; it seemed likely.

The commander sighed over the line. "Alright, slap a Moon Belt and camfoil on him and bring him back to Haven."

"Sir? Are we equipped to handle him?" Holly questioned. She could all too clearly picture the consequences of Artemis's ice being unleashed in Haven.

"More than anyone else on the planet." Root put it simply. "If Fowl has his own room or method to keep his powers at bay, we'll help him get to it then. For now, bring him here. Surely we can rig up heaters and sedatives if it starts to get out of hand."

"Got it, sir." Holly pulled out her camfoil and expertly wrapped Artemis snuggly inside it. And if his feet dangled out a bit, well, she doubted anyone would actually notice for the _freak snowstorm_ plaguing London. Hefting Artemis into her arms, Holly carried him bridal-style towards the exit she had made. As she was about to squeeze her and Artemis through, a thought struck her.

"Commander?"

"Yes, Captain Short?"

"Do you think – do you think we could send someone for Butler? Artemis might be – might appreciate being able to bury him." That, and it felt wrong to leave Butler's body behind, to be left for the Mud Men to uncover or to rot away in the ice.

Foaly hummed. "That's actually not a bad idea. Certainly can't hurt to give Artemis a reason to cooperate."

Root hesitated a second more, then agreed. "I'll send Retrieval One in once the storm clears enough for us to get our equipment through. You just get clear and get back."

"Yes, sir. Signing off." Holly reactivated her wings and slipped out the window in the ice, preparing to battle the fierce storm once more.

* * *

The trip back was both harder and easier. Artemis's dead weight, even cut down by the Moon Belt, proved a major hindrance, especially considering it monopolized the use of her hands. She was forced to drop him in the snow a couple times (to vague stirrings and moans of protest) when the wind knocked her already unbalanced form to the ground. Thankfully, though, the storm was winding down ever so slowly, and the journey was a bit less punishing than the first time. Still, Holly breathed a sigh of relief when she finally got far enough away from the heart of the storm to take the air, and felt even more grateful that the wind was now at her back, acting as a propellant rather than a resistance.

Foaly relayed information about the situation in London through the earpiece in her helmet. The humans had began to notice that the storm was dying, and a couple of the braver souls were inching towards the boundary of the ruined sector of the city. News channels all over the world were broadcasting live feeds, reporting estimated fatalities, speculating what could have happened (each theory more unlikely and ridiculous than the last) and calling in experts to do the scientific thinking for them. Out of all the theories, though, none came close to the truth, and for that Holly breathed a sigh of relief.

"Foaly," Holly asked into her helmet, "what about the Fowls? Where are they in all of this?"

The furious tapping of keyboards preceded the appearance of several small images on Holly's visor. "Helsinki University Hospital, physical therapy wing. Angeline's staying in a nearby hotel. When the news broke, Angeline raced to the hospital and hasn't stopped trying to call Artemis's cell or Fowl Manor since." The pictures Foaly showed her were clearly obtained from security cameras that needed to have been updated several years ago. The stills showed Angeline rushing through the doors of the hospital and past the service desk, joining Artemis Sr. in his room, where he was already watching the news with rapt attention, and finally Angeline pacing back and forth frantically as she held a phone to her ear.

Holly sighed. "At least they're out of the way for now. Ireland's a long way to travel from Finland, and I doubt many airlines are still up and running. Artemis will have to come up with some story for them, though."

"Hmm." Foaly hummed in agreement before changing the subject. "Root's sent Retrieval out. ETA to London is about an hour, then another couple hours to get everything in and out."

Holly's heart dropped at the reminder. "Alright." She nodded. "I should hit Stonehenge in another 30 minutes. Shuttle still waiting for me?"

"Yep." A hesitation. "Fly safe."

"Will do. Over and out." Holly returned to the task of flight, mind poking and prodding at the mystery of the young human she carried in her arms.

* * *

Artemis woke slowly, his mind a gray fuzz that did not want to let him go. _Drugs_ , he recognized. He had been tranquilized. By who and how was something that he could not determine, the haze settling over his most recent memories, obscuring the details. His chest, limbs, and tongue felt heavy with the last lingering remnants of the drug, and it was all he could do to open his eyes into slits and peer at his surroundings.

He was in a small room that seemed like a mish-mash of a hospital room and a jail cell. The walls were smooth cinderblock and painted a soothing light cream, but lacked any sort of adornment. A niche in the wall held a small sink and hand-sanitizer container. Artemis himself was lying on a clunky, hospital-style bed too small for his frame. His feet were dangling over the edge of the railing and his head, propped up into an almost sitting position, was nearly scrapping the railing at the head. Smooth plastic bands were clamped around his wrists and bond him to the bed. A monitor to his left was beeping out his heart beat, with Gnommish symbols flying by at the bottom in a summary of his condition. A Plexi-glass door lacking any sort of visible locking mechanism closed off the small room from the hallway outside, where poised alertly in a chair was the all-too familiar from of a LEPrecon officer, helmet hiding any hint of features that might have told Artemis who it was.

He had not yet made any obvious movements to indicate that he was awake - his deep breathing and barely opened eyes were enough to fool anyone not strictly paying attention to his every twitch - and this gave Artemis time to wonder what the LEP could possibly want with him. This wondering, in turn, prompted the memory of the C-Cube, the meeting about it with Spiro, and -

Artemis's breath hitched in his throat, and his eyes opened wide. _Butler, lying on a broken table and blood pouring from a hole in his chest_.

"No." He whispered, his brain unable to comprehend this fact. Butler. How - how could Butler be -

Realizing this, it also dawned on him, with an icy chill down his spine, that it wasn't the sedative causing the heavy feelings in his limbs, but the pure exhaustion that always came with the overexertion of his powers.

"No." He repeated louder, an ugly, empty feeling filling his chest. What had he done? _What had he done?_

The LEPrecon officer was approaching the door, now aware that he was conscious. A long stretch on time passed as the officer fiddled with security that Artemis could not see from his vantage point. He tried to wiggle himself into a more respectable position, but the combination of his exhaustion and the bands around his wrists made that next to impossible.

The officer entered the room, pulling the door shut behind them, and lifted the vizier on their helmet.

"Captain Short." Artemis addressed, an mixture of weariness and desperation coloring his voice. It was obvious, now, that it was Captain Short. She was the most qualified of the LEP to deal with him, having already done so on two separate occasions. Perhaps that familiarity would gain him answers now.

"Artemis." Holly nodded. The expression on her face was difficult to name; she had never looked at him like that before. It was caution, Artemis decided, warring with curiosity, unease, and the desire to keep her face blank. Troubling to say the least. The panic stirring in his gut increased tenfold, and the lack of ice accumulating around him only worsened it. How much power had he used if none was coming now?

"What has happened?" He asked hesitantly. His mouth was dry, he noted, and his hands shook in their confines.

"What do you remember?" Holly's approach to his bedside was slow and obvious, like she was trying not to spook an animal. She knew, Artemis knew, and he wondered if he should feel offended by the comparison to a wild animal.

"I remember the restaurant." Artemis began. He briefly considered mentioning the C-Cube, but chucked it. There was time for that later; right now, he needed answers. "There was - it was a trap. Butler -" His voice hitched, and tears were welling up behind his eyes. The image of the life fading from Butler's eyes was superimposed in his mind and he had no doubt it would remain there until he died. He knew what he was supposed to say to Holly, but he couldn't get the words out. Butler was - it was - how could he say it?

"What happened?" He choked out instead. "What happened after?" He couldn't remember anything after the gunshot, after learning Butler's name - Domovoi, a Slavic protective sprite, how suitably ironic - and the blank coupled with his lack of power terrified him.

"We know it wasn't your fault." She was beating around the brush, something so unlike Holly that Artemis couldn't help but snap at her.

" _What_ wasn't my fault? Butler? My powers?!" Holly twitched at the mention of his powers, confirming what Artemis was dreading to be true.

"What did I do? Tell me!" He cried. "Please." He added on a second later. "I need to know."

Holly swallowed roughly. In the hours she had spent waiting for Artemis to wake up, she had not managed to figure out a good way to tell him. How you tell someone they released a storm in the middle of London?

She had never seen Artemis this way before. Even during the rescue of his father and in Koboi labs, he had been composed and relatively calm (of course, if he had let some snow slip in the Artic, who would have noticed?). Now, his eyes were wild and frantic, blinking back tears. His hands were shaking in the bands that kept him from getting too far off the bed. There was actual emotion in his voice, and his body shivered slightly. He was scared, Holly realized, and not even bothering to hide it. He knew that something huge had happened, and that absolutely terrified him. How could Holly be the one to tell him just how much destruction was wrought?

She decided to start at the beginning.

"We know Butler was shot, and we think that that was the trigger."

"Trigger for -" Artemis began to ask, frustration now coloring his tone.

"The snowstorm." Holly finally said. Artemis immediately fell silent.

"Snowstorm?" He repeated in a hushed voice.

"More like a snow tornado." Holly admitted. "It went more up than out." She said, trying to offer some mediocre kind of relief. It was true that it had extend far up to the sky, but it was plenty wide, at least a good couple square miles.

"How many?" Artemis asked flatly, all the life he had shown in him earlier instantly gone.

"Artemis?"

"How many people did I hurt?" His voice quavered. He didn't want to know, not really, but he needed to. What had he done to London, to its people? "I am not an idiot, Holly, I know that the streets would have been packed with - with residents and - and tourists -"

"We don't know yet." Holly admitted. "The Mud People have only just been able to return to that part of the city; all they have right now are estimates."

"Then give me an estimate."

Holly bit her lip. "Foaly's money is on 1000 dead, at least. He thinks it will rise when the ice thaws."

For a moment, Artemis's expression did not change, as if the information had not yet processed in his brain. But his breath hitched, and his eyes widened and watered, and his complexion went even paler (something Holly had not thought possible).

He lurched forward against his bonds, and Holly jumped back in surprise. What was he -

Artemis vomited over the side of the bed, horrible retching noises accompanying the sickening splashes of the contents of his stomach hitting the floor. Holly winced, then sighed. She should have seen that coming, but she hadn't thought that Artemis would have a sensitive stomach. It hadn't really occurred to her that Artemis felt emotions at all, though, before this entire mess.

He had always been like a robot or a statue in her memories and nightmares. Cold, unfeeling, and rigid, confined to the paths of his own logic. The rescue of his father had chipped away at that idea, but the dead-eyed vampire-skinned adolescent that had kidnapped her was far more prominent in her mind than the child that had cried for a solid minute upon hearing that his father had come back to him. Now though, it was nearly impossible to equate the monstrous Mud Boy with the youth getting sick over the bedside.

The skin around Artemis's wrist was turning red (a monumental feat), straining against his bonds as he was. Holly leaned over to the keypads locking Artemis's left arm in place and quickly tapped in the code to release it (the cuffs had not been her idea, as she was fairly certain Artemis could break them with either his mind or his ice without breaking a sweat, but higher-ranking officers insisted), allowing Artemis to fully lean over the edge as he gagged. Holly sighed again, this time with sympathy. No person should have to hear things like this, not even Artemis Fowl.

He was just dry-heaving now, a sound almost worse than the vomiting, loud pants and choking sounds and the tell-tale shuddering gasps. Holly almost wanted to reach out a hand, but she had no idea how Artemis would react to any attempted contact. So she stood awkwardly at the bedside, waiting for Artemis's stomach to calm.

Eventually, Artemis's breath evened out, fast and shaky but no longer choking on nothing. He took advantage of his free hand to prop himself up into a sitting position, pulling his legs up to his chest and wrapping his free arm around them. He glanced at the other cuff that forced his left arm to the bed and contemplated cracking the lock, but such an action would probably not help convince the People he meant no harm. He didn't; he didn't want to hurt anyone, fairy or human. But . . .

His hands were growing familiarly cold. Shocked, Artemis pulled his thoughts away and darted his gaze around the room, looking for something else to focus on, some kind of distraction. How had his powers returned so soon? Wait, it didn't matter how. He couldn't let his powers get away again. Never again. Hadn't he already done enough damage?

His eyes lit upon the sink. "Water?" He croaked. He shook himself. "May I have some water, please?" But that was more than he deserved; he had killed so many people, why should he think he deserved water?

Nevertheless, Holly scurried over to the sink in the corner and filled a glass for him. He accepted it with trembling hands and took a tentative sip. The taste was purer than any tap water he had ever tasted before, speaking volumes of the People's filtration technology. It was probably also pumped straight from underground springs.

_That's it, just focus on the water. Not the hundreds of lives lost because of you. The water. Safe, boring, unemotional water._

"Thank you." He murmured, twirling the cup in his hands and pretending he didn't feel it growing colder and colder.

"It's nothing." Holly muttered back. "I'll get someone to come clean this up soon."

"I'm sorry." He knew Holly would know it wasn't the puddle of sick he was apologizing for. But how could he possibly apologize for the lives he had taken? For the innocent people - men, women, _Butler, children_ -

_Water. The water. The clean, plain water. Be like the water. Still, unchanging, calm . . ._

"Artemis, we know you didn't mean to." Holly's tone was too soft, too gentle. Where was the anger, the rage? He killed people! He was a monster! Why wasn't she angry with him? Captain Holly Short was not soft nor daft. Why was she speaking as if to a victim?

"That doesn't excuse it!" Artemis bit. "It's my fault."

_My fault, my fault, my fault. No, stop. Focus on the water. Calm, tasteless, pure, calm, calm, calm, ca-_

But the water was not calm. His hands were shaking violently, and the glass had started to frost over, the water turning to ice, faster and faster.

_No, no, stop! Calm, calm, calm!_

"Artemis -" Holly stopped. She had seen the freezing water. "Artemis, what are you doing?"

"I'm sorry. I'm not trying to do this; I can't - " He couldn't stop it; he was trying to rein it back in, the stirrings of power that were gathering inside him and filling the air, but he couldn't. The temperature of the room was dropping and his water glass was completely frozen over.

" _Artemis, it's okay. Calm down_." Holly was using her Mesmer. He could hear the bells in her voice, but unfortunately he wasn't looking in her eyes.

"I'm trying!" And he was, he really was. He was doing his best to wrangle his power back into place, to pull it back inside him, but it was so strong and he was still so mentally and emotionally exhausted. He couldn't stop the ice from manifesting his guilt, his terror.

 _Ka-shh!_ The glass shattered in his hands, falling into ice-coated shards in his lap.

"Whoa!" Holly stepped back in surprise.

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to." Artemis scrambled. He placed a hand on the mattress, but sharply pulled it back to his chest when the ice began to spread to the bed as well. He pushed himself as far back as he could, using his free hand to freeze and shatter the chain shackling his right hand so he could scoot further back. The ice from that small contact on the mattress was still spreading across the bed, though. Patterns of frost and snow coated the bed sheets, swirling hypnotically in the light.

"It's alright, Artemis. It was just an accident. It's fine." Holly held her hands out in a calming gesture. "You're fine. It's fine." She took a step forward.

"No!" Artemis shouted. "Don't come closer!" He cradled his hands tight against his chest. "I can't control it; I don't want to hurt you too!"

"You won't." Holly soothed.

"How can you know that? I hurt Butler. I hurt _innocent people_."

"You didn't mean to."

"I still did _._ Get _away_ from me! _Please._ " Holly froze. If she didn't know better, she would have said that Artemis was _begging_. But that couldn't be right. Artemis Fowl the Second would never do something as demeaning as beg. But if anything had become clear in these past few minutes and hours, it was that she didn't know Artemis Fowl quite as well as she thought she had. Maybe no one did.

"Please." Artemis said again. "Just leave me alone." Ice was climbing the walls, radiating out from the spot where Artemis was plastered against the bed frame pressed against the wall. Frost floated in the air around him, anxiously swirling off the ice and around Artemis's head, once again streaking his pitch hair with white and gray and dusting his clothes with fine white powder.

Holly sighed, then took a step back. "Alright." There was no use in pushing Artemis. It was clear that he did not yet have a grip on his powers again, and the results could be catastrophic if she kept trying to approach him. "The Commander will want to talk to you soon, though, and I can't stop him."

Artemis nodded grimly. "Thank you." He murmured.

Holly walked back to the door, shivering slightly in the chill that now draped the room. She glanced back over her shoulder at Artemis and felt something in her chest twist at the sight of the boy, curled into a ball at the front of the bed and surrounded by expanding ice and swirling frost.

"If you need anything, there's a button on the monitor." Holly feebly offered.

Artemis gave a vague nod, but Holly doubt her words had even registered with him. His lips were twitching into wisps of words, and he was wringing his hands tightly, his eyes now fluttering shut.

Biting her lip, Holly turned and closed the door behind her.

* * *

"Well that went well." Foaly said as Holly entered the Ops room.

"Shut up. He didn't bring the roof down; that's got to count for something." There was no bite in Holly's words, though.

As usual, a good dozen different windows were open on the centaur's multiple screens and monitors. Front and center on the main screen was a live camera feed of Artemis's cri-med room (Cri-med rooms, short for criminal medication, were rooms in Police Plaza where recently arrested criminal fairies could be treated for medical problems while being kept under a watchful eye.). Holly was dismayed but unsurprised to see even more ice coating the walls and now the floor. Artemis had moved to a corner of the room, his legs curled up in front of him and arms held tight against his body. His head was bowed, so Holly couldn't see his face, but she saw the human's shoulders shaking and body trembling and could deduce the rest.

"Did you have to tell him about the death toll?" Root's voice didn't sound accusatory, thank Frond.

"He would have found out somehow, sir." Holly justified. "I thought it best to be up front about it. We want him to trust us, don't we?"

"That won't really matter if he freezes the Plaza." Root chewed at the end of an unlit cigar.

"Should we turn on the heaters?"

Root mulled it over. "Fowl said the heat makes him 'uncomfortable'. Do we really want to find out what that means? We don't want to kill the Mud Boy."

"How about the hallways?" Foaly tossed his two cents in. "Contain the ice, but let Artemis let off steam - well, snow, anyway."

"Do it." Root waved to signal Foaly's clacking on his keyboard.

"What's happening with London now?" Holly asked, walking over to Foaly's computers. Surely at least one of them had information about the city displayed on it.

"The storm's finally died completely, and the Mud Men have started smashing and burning their way through the ice." Foaly called up images of human firefighters slashing with their axes at the walls of ice that clogged the ruined streets. Black body bags had already began to be laid out and filled.

"How long is that going to take?" Holly wondered aloud.

"Weeks." Foaly said with certainty. "Maybe months. Artemis left them a nice cold snap to deal with as well, so you can't expect much of the ice to start melting anytime soon."

"The Mud Men have an official explanation?" Root asked.

"Some pile of crap about rising humidity levels and low pressure zones." Foaly chuckled. "They're trying to blame a snowstorm on what amounts to global warming, and absolutely no one believes it, especially with all the ice walls clogging the streets and the mountains of ice."

"Well do your best to promote that pile of crap with some of your scientific mumbo-jumbo." Root ordered. "I doubt that anyone would guess that any one person caused this, but the sooner they have a secure explanation, the less they'll investigate. With our luck, someone will end up digging up some security camera or phone camera that caught Artemis pulling a Jack Frost and start asking too many questions."

"Run with the pile of crap story, got it." Which meant his underlings got it, but same difference.

"Short, how long do you think it will be before Fowl is fit for interrogation about the ping?" Root moved on.

"I'd give it a couple hours, sir. Maybe longer." Holly advised.

Root clamped down harder on his cigar, clearly not liking the thought he'd have to wait even longer to find out about the violation of Haven's security. It had been several hours since the lockdown had been initiated, and the People were getting antsy, both in law enforcement and the public. He needed to produce answers, and soon.

"His power's aren't stable, sir." Holly guessed what the commander was thinking. "He needs time to get a grip on them again before we burst in there asking questions. Otherwise he might accidently freeze you solid."

"Not taking killing hundreds of people well. Shocker." Foaly muttered.

"Can it, centaur!" Root barked. He turned back to Holly. "Stay here and keep an eye on him. The moment you think he can be talked with without getting turned into an icicle, contact me."

"Yes, sir."

"Same goes to you, Foaly. If you find anything useful -"

"You'll be the second to know." Foaly acknowledged.

"I'm going to go update the council. They asked to be kept in the loop." With that, Commander Root took his leave.

Holly turned back to the window tab showing Artemis's room. Her heart sank in her chest. She really didn't want to have to be the one watching Artemis fall apart. Her brown eyes roamed around the screen, looking for something else to distract her. In the corner of the monitor, she spotted another room coated with ice and cloudy with mist. Her eyes narrowed in confusion.

"Foaly," she asked, "what's that?"

"Hmm?" Foaly followed her pointed finger. "Oh, that's where Butler's body is. We just cut out the entire block and winched it out of there; far easier than trying to laser the body itself out of the ice. Didn't want it to melt, figured Fowl would prefer an non-decomposing body, so I cranked the temperature down to freezing."

"Oh." Yet again something she really didn't want to think about. Whatever she (had?) thought about his boss, she had respected Butler for his prowess in battle and the genuinely good heart that she believed he had had. To think that such a man had fallen to an unknown assailant was nearly unthinkable; it was almost like thinking of a mountain collapsing or ceasing to exist. It was a monumental presence you took for granted as a fact of life. How could you comprehend it being gone?

"Foaly, do we have any idea what happened in that restaurant?" Holly growled.

Foaly sighed. "Well, the Retrieval team managed to chip out a couple of security cameras. There's no telling what survived in its memory banks, but I'm pulling what I can get. Probably not much of anything, but here's hoping it's more than yesterday's lunch special."

A couple more clacking of old-fashioned keyboard keys, and one final more tap added for dramatic effect, and a fuzzy white box appeared on the screen in front of the centaur tech.

"Well that's helpful." Holly said dryly. "More snow."

"Ye of little faith." Foaly tapped a few more keys. Two little green triangles appeared in the upper right corner and the extremely ancient sound of a VCR tape fast forwarding played over the speakers. Holly felt like rolling her eyes at that touch. For someone so passionate about technology, the centaur was surprisingly low-tech with personal touches.

Snow, snow, more snow, then -

"Wait, go back!" Holly said as she caught a flash of something that wasn't static.

Foaly had caught it too, already backtracking to the scene.

It wasn't much, just a still that had survived the damage done to the rest of the camera's records. The time stamp in the corner dated the shot to the current date, only minutes before the ping had gone off. It wasn't difficult to pick out Artemis and Butler from the crowd of patrons, lurking in a corner of the frame only barely in the camera's line of view; clearly they had been trying to hide in the camera's blind spot and only just failed. They weren't alone, though.

Another monster of a man stood opposite them, glaring in a threatening way at Butler. This other muscular man was standing in between the camera and another man, the only thing visible of this other man a pair of hands decked in several thousands of dollars of gold bangles, chains, and rings. They were gesturing at Artemis, who had his usual smug little smirk in place.

Holly never thought that she would miss that expression that usually made her want to punch the Mud Boy across the jaw.

"He was meeting with someone." Holly said aloud. "He mentioned that it was a trap."

"Hmm." Foaly murmured. "Unfortunately, that Mud Man is directly in between the camera and whoever Arty-boy is meeting with." Foaly zoomed in on the pair of hands, then blinked. "Wait a second." He narrowed the focus onto one of the man's bracelets, a thick gold one. A thick engraved bracelet.

Holly saw what Foaly was getting at. "Can you enhance the image?"

Foaly snorted. "Can I?"

" . . . Well, can you?"

"Of course I can!"

Foaly isolated the bangle in question, rotated it to a comfortable reading angle, and enhanced the image, pixels growing and shrinking and coming into focus until finally the engraving could be read.

"Jon Spiro?" Holly read out loud.

"On it." Foaly tapped out the name into his own personal search engine. "Jon Spiro. Shady Chicago-based businessman, and I use the term businessman as loosely as possible. Law enforcement has been trying to pin something on the man for over 30 years, but he always manages to skate away. Industrial espionages, pollution, abduction, Mob connections; he's got it all."

"Why on earth would Artemis be meeting with a man like that?"

Foaly shrugged. "Liaison for Daddy Fowl's empire? One criminal to another?"

Holly frowned. "Fowl Sr. is still in the hospital missing a leg. I don't think building his criminal empire is at the forefront of his mind."

"You said Artemis mentioned something about a trap? Maybe Spiro called the meeting."

"Maybe." It didn't feel right though. "Can you go back to the original photo?"

Foaly banished the ID bracelet that had served its purpose and called up the original image.

Holly studied the image. "Alright, what do we know? Artemis is meeting with a Mob boss Mud Man. Minutes later, a ping goes off from his location."

"Pretty safe to bet that Artemis pinged us. He's the only person in that room that knows we exist and has had access to our tech." Foaly nodded.

"A few minutes after that, Butler is shot, and Artemis goes ballistic." Holly finished.

"The meeting went south?" Foaly hazarded a guess. "Someone said something, a disagreement happens, and Butler takes a bullet."

"Probably for Artemis." Holly said softly, remembering Artemis's instance that it was fault Butler was hurt.

Foaly nodded along. "Butler goes down, Artemis unleashes a snowstorm in anger."

"So . . . the ping is benign."

Foaly snorted. "I wouldn't say benign - Artemis got far more information than I'm comfortable with him having - but I don't think he's going to be revealing it to any of the Mud Men governments or news sites anytime soon."

"So we can lift the lockdown?"

"Root might want to talk to Artemis and confirm our speculations, but I'd say the odds of another ping are pretty low. My only question," Foaly mused, "is why Artemis pinged us during a meeting."

Holly shrugged. That bugged her too, but that could be saved for later. Artemis was the one who got the information, and he was in their custody. There was no shadowy Mud Man organization with proof of the People or some lucky tech whiz gearing up to sell the information to CNN, and for now, that was all they needed to know.

* * *

Artemis was meditating. He had sent himself to the dream-state he usually occupied when planning a crime, but was using the space now to distance himself from his emotions. Floating in his own head, his thoughts wisps that vanished as soon as they appeared if he did not grab hold, Artemis could forget the guilt and the grief and concentrate on his next steps.

It was not a permanent solution. His hold over this state was tenuous at best. One distraction or disturbance in the over-world and he would be sent rocketing back into reality, his emotions slamming back into him and the ice growing stronger from them. He could not rely on meditation to keep from losing control; he had to find another way.

He had thought he had mastered them. He had thought that he had capped his emotions deep down where they could not affect him, his judgment, or his powers. Apparently he had not. All it took was one slip, one expression of grief and anger at the barbaric assassin that had ripped Butler from his life, and all his power had overflowed and reacted - violently.

It could not happen again. He could not let himself get so swept away in his emotions that he lashed out that way. He knew that, had known it since he was a child. He thought that what he had done was enough, that with his superior intellect and self-control he could cage his emotions and banish them. But that had never been true. They were still there, lurking beneath the surface, waiting for a chink in the armor, a crack in the façade to worm their way through. Artemis was not a sociopath. He could not pretend he did not feel; he could not turn the emotions off. He had tried so hard to do so, but he had failed, and London had paid the price.

He needed control, better control than he had had before. He needed to learn how to handle his powers and their connection to his emotions. It was not something he had done much experimentation with in the past few years. After learning what exactly his ice could do when he felt too strongly, he had immediately set his efforts into not feeling at all. Playing with his powers was something he rarely did, all too aware that if he got swept away in the emotions and feelings it could all too easily spin out of control.

But now it seemed he had no choice. He had to figure out how to exercise more control over his emotions and his ability. If he did not, what happened in London could happen again, and who knew how much damage would be done before someone could stop him? What if he was in another crowded city center? What if he was near a daycare or a school? What if he was at Fowl Manor? No. No. He could not let that happen. He could not walk among innocents and the people he cared about as a ticking time bomb. He had to hid himself, tuck away into some crevice or corner of the earth that no one would find him until he was confident he wouldn't break again. He needed to rebuild his walls even stronger than before, forge new armor, gain a new grip on his powers. He would not another person die because of him.

With that last thought, his concentration was shattered.

"Fowl."

Emerging from the dream state was never pleasant. Artemis shook his head and took a sharp breath in as he regained his footing in reality. Opening his eyes, he was dismayed to see that the ice had continued to expand, even while he hid in his own head. Blinking and reorienting himself, he turned his head to the figure standing in the doorway.

"Commander." Artemis said simply. "Captain Short told me you would come." Artemis stood shakily, but remained standing in the corner he occupied.

The commander nodded, breath visible in the chilled air. "Minutes before the ice, we got pinged from your location." He jumped right in.

Ah. So they had registered his unintentional intrusion. "Yes, that was me, if that is what you're asking."

The commander looked simultaneously irked and relieved. "Why?"

Artemis hesitated. How much did he need to tell them? "A demonstration." He settled. "I was demonstrating a new piece of technology cobbled together from concepts I had learned from examining you technology, but I had no idea it could detect the People's tech as well as human's. I assure you if I had known, I would have disabled that function."

The commander glared sharply at him, and Artemis wondered what he had said to promote such a response. "What were you doing showing fairy-based technology to Jon Spiro?"

Well, that was a surprise. "You know about Jon Spiro?"

"You expect to destroy a couple square miles of London and us not to investigate? Now answer the D'Arviting question!"

Artemis flinched. A couple square _miles?_ Holly had said the estimate was a thousand lives . . . Miles. He destroyed miles.

"I - I did not intend to sell it to him. I -" Artemis swallowed, "I underestimated him."

_And Butler paid the price._

The temperature dropped. The snow and frost swirled anxiously at his feet.

 _No, no, stop it._ Artemis barked in his head. _Calm down, breathe, in, out, in, out . . ._

"He stole it from me." Artemis said slowly, focusing more on his breathing and heartbeat than his actual words. "He and his hired gun, A-Arno Blunt. They had filled the restaurant with gunmen. Butler had prepared for trouble, and got most of them with a sonic grenade, but Blunt -" Artemis's voice choked, the scene all too visible in his mind. The snow whirled in the air around him, picking up speed and filling the room with a biting cold.

"Artemis - " He heard the commander say.

"Blunt shot him." Artemis growled. "He was aiming at me but Butler jumped in front of the gun!" That bullet was meant for him, and how much better would things be if that bullet had hit its mark? Butler would be alive, London would be whole, the people he killed and the families he had ripped apart would be healthy. What had Butler been thinking when he took that bullet for him?!

A small voice in the back of his mind said "his job" but Artemis shut that out. Butler was more than an employee, more than a bodyguard. Butler was _family_ , a second _father,_ and he was DEAD because of Artemis.

He didn't register himself falling to his knees, or the ice spikes growing from the ground, or the whirlwind of snow that formed around him. He did, however, feel the sharp pinch of a needle jammed into his neck. He reached a shaking hand up, suddenly feeling an enormous drain of energy in his limbs. His fingers wrapped around a metal cylinder, and he pulled it from his neck and held it out in front of him.

 _A dart_ , his mind foggily suggested.

Drugs.

 _Not again_ , he mentally complained before lurching sideways and crumbling to the ground.

* * *

Root sighed as the Mud Boy collapsed, the drug forcefully injected into his system taking hold and shutting him down.

"What are we going to do with you?" He murmured. Barely two minutes into the conversation and Fowl had already lost control. He hadn't wanted to immediately dart the human, but the intensity of the snow whipping through the room had concerned Root. Despite the calming front the boy had shown on the video feed, it was clear that he had not regained control of his emotions. Or if he had, the mention of Butler had dissolved whatever control the Mud Boy had managed to regain.

What were they going to do with him? Keeping him here in Police Plaza smacked of bad idea. Yet Root was not prepared to let him return to the surface world when the boy was so unbalanced and overcome with grief. A situation like London could easily arise again, and who knew how long it would take for the LEP to arrive on the scene? Root wanted him under watch. Letting him walk around unchecked would be like allowing goblins armed with nuclear weapons to wander Haven - a disaster waiting to happen.

First things first. Artemis Fowl could not stay in such a crowded area this volatile.

Root reached up to tap his earpiece. "Foaly, get a team to set up a medical room at Ground Zero. Stock it with tranquilizers and sedatives. Also call a van up front and a stretcher to Fowl's room."

"Anything else?" Somehow, Foaly could make even that simple remark sound sarcastic.

"Yeah. Hack the Fowl boy's computer and find out just what he created."

"He didn't tell you?"

"No, but I'm sure I'm not going to like it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe all the positive response. I never thought people would like this.   
> Hope you enjoyed this part! Leave your feedback and responses below please, it really helps me improve my writing.   
> See you next time!


	3. Part Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey . . . how long has it been? Sorry . . . 
> 
> On the plus side, this chapter is of a decent length, I think. I almost wanted to hold off on releasing it and continue writing, but I realized I probably wouldn't reach another decent stopping point until a long ways off, so I decided to end it where I did.
> 
> Note: I'm American, and therefore use Fahrenheit. Sorry. I did use kilometers over miles, since the fairies do, and I have some concept of how much that is. 
> 
> I won't keep you any longer, and put the rest of my notes at the end. Enjoy!

The first thing he became aware of was his pounding head; mallets were beating an unforgiving drumbeat against the inside of his skull. The sensation of feeling flowed to his mouth where he was choking on the desert on his tongue and his throat was raw and dry. His flesh sizzled like a slab of meat on a backyard grill, and Artemis shook with the desire to slip away from his own skin. His eyes cracked open.

The world was a confusing blur of light and shadow, and Artemis frowned before blinking away the remnants of haze. The world righted itself and separated.

Yet another hospital-style bed was underneath him, but he was definitely not in a hospital. Whereas before he was in a small room of smooth cinderblock walls, now he laid beside roughly hewn walls that suggested a cave. Slowly, with protesting muscles, Artemis sat up to look around.

He was in an enormous open cavern. The roof of this pocket of air in earth rose about 20 feet above Artemis's head, and continued on to his right for far longer than Artemis's vision could follow. Straight in front of him, Artemis could just barely make out another wall of the cavern about 50 yards across the sandy floor. To his left, maybe 25 yards away, was a small gray cube of metal-plated walls. A reinforced steel door and a Plexiglass window told Artemis that it was an observation room.

In Artemis's immediate vicinity, another heart monitor beeped out his vital signs, relayed from a smooth bracelet clasped tight around his wrist. He was not chained this time, free to stand and move around if he so desired. That is, if he could withstand the heat being vented into the room by the steel ducts Artemis could see dotting the walls around him. It was perhaps only 85 degrees Fahrenheit, but anything over 75 degrees was enough to make Artemis start to grow weak and ill. He wasn't quite sure why the heat affected him in such a severe manner, though he had theories about the difference between his own internal temperature (something that had been steadily dropping throughout his life) and the external temperature trying to reach thermal equilibrium.

In Ireland, the weather rarely exceeded 70 degrees, even in the summer, so it was quite easy to avoid overheating. He did of course travel, but he usually prepared in advance for extreme temperatures by carrying several handmade ice packs that could be concealed beneath his clothing and keep his body pleasantly cool. He had been carrying no such thing when he had crossed the Irish Sea and now dearly regretted such a short-sighted decision.

Artemis swayed with nausea and flopped back onto the bed, buried his face into the mattress, and groaned. So they had taken his advice about the heat. He had thought they would at some point, it was only rational, but that didn't make it any easier to bear. Heat made him feel ill in a way that nothing else could. It drained the energy from his body and smothered the remains, wringing sweat from him and stuffing his head with cotton. His throat clamped shut and every breath was a struggle. If it was possible for a human being to melt, Artemis was certain he would one day under the oppressive nature of warmth.

_Quit overreacting_ , he barked in his mind. He wouldn't die from this. The heat would not kill him unless it was over 104 degrees, just as it would a normal human. A night in a hotel with a busted thermostat had made that clear to Artemis when he was about 9. No, the heat was no more lethal to him than it was to any Average Joe. It just made him feel sick as a dog.

His eyes drifted to his hand. For the one of the first times in his life, he was actually tempted to use his powers. He could summon a small layer of ice to cover his skin and cold water to -

_NO!_ What on earth was he thinking?! He couldn't use his powers like that, for something so frivolous. They were dangerous. _He_ was dangerous. If he gave even an inch, who knew how much more his powers would take? What was _wrong_ with him? He deserved to be like this, _needed_ to be like this. He couldn't be allowed to hurt anyone else ever again. If it took nearly knocking him out, then so be it. Whatever it took to make sure he never brought on another storm.

His fingers clenched into fists as he screwed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth. Why was he even still alive? What was the point of the fairies keeping him alive at this point? He was nothing but a liability and a threat to every living thing on this planet. Surely the thought had crossed the mind of at least one person in the chain of command. It would be so easy to fire a round into his head, or poison him, or hit him with a biobomb. Why hadn't someone pulled the trigger?

Oh, wait. The C Cube. He remembered briefly mentioning it to the Commander. They would want to know what it was, and there was less than a 15% chance of Foaly getting the plans from his computer. They needed him to talk, to make sure the device that had pinged their systems was no longer a threat. Was the heat an interrogation technique as well as a safeguard? Sweat the truth out of him?

He let out a strangled chuckle at the absolutely _horrible_ pun. God, the heat was already getting to him. He half-expected to feel his brain leaking from his ears. There was no other explanation for such a thought trying to pass itself off as a joke.

A nearly silent hiss perked Artemis's ears. He lifted his head just enough so he could see the steel door slid open and allow two small figures into the room.

_Captain Short and Commander Root_ , his brain identified. He pushed himself up into a sitting position, doing his best to try and give some semblance of decorum, but his body continued to sway slightly as he did his best to regain the focus necessary for conversation.

Several questions he wanted to ask rumbled around his mind, but what fell out was, "Where am I?"

"Welcome to Ground Zero, Fowl." Root shifted his stance, and Artemis picked up the extra padding on the suits both he and Holly wore. Protection. From his ice? They weren't taking any chances. An exhausted kind of relief fell numbly into his stomach. _Good_.

"Ground Zero? A bomb site?" A good choice. An area designed to contain explosions from hurting civilians or spectators. No doubt the walls and ceiling were all reinforced with supports and steel plating.

"Yep. Where the original bio-bombs were tested all those decades ago. The plan was to turn the place into a new enclave for the People but -" Root shrugged.

Artemis stiffened. Bio-bombs? Blue rinses had been set off here? His eyes quickly scanned the room again, as if he would now see the signs of the deadly radiation now that he knew what had happened.

"Yeah, that." Root nodded, seeing the expression on his face. "You say the words 'bio-bomb' or 'blue rinse' and all potential inhabitants go up in smoke."

"Don't worry," Holly spoke, "the levels are back down to normal, or so Foaly says. Considering it was almost a home for the People, it should be fine for you, Mud Boy."

Artemis just nodded, though, too mentally tired to give much more care. Hadn't he just been thinking a blue rinse was in order right about now? A part of him mentally shook at the blasé nature he was applying to his health, but it was only a small voice, and Artemis was beginning to feel so worn. The constant drugging wasn't helping his mental state much either. Everything was so fuzzy and uncertain in his head, and the grief and discomfort he was feeling was weighing heavy on his heart. It made for a truly frightening combination in terms of his will to survive.

"I assume you are here to ask about the device that detected your systems," Artemis huffed.

"Yes." Root ground out, looking a bit peeved. Most likely at the fact that they had had to come ask him, rather than just rely on Foaly's hacking skills.

"It was called the C-Cube. I had made it . . ." Artemis trailed off. Why had he made it? To extort money from Jon Spiro. Not to release to the world like he had threatened to do, just to scare Spiro into handing over a ton of gold and buying into the Fowl business, simultaneously increasing the worth of his business and destroying that of one of his main competitor in the communications market. That was it.

And Butler had paid the price.

"Fowl." Root snapped his fingers in Artemis's face, derailing Artemis's train of thought. "Focus."

"Yes, sorry. I apologize." Artemis shook his head, wincing at the headache that action fueled. "I had no intention of actually selling it, nor did I know it was capable of breaking through your encryptions. I would have never shown such capabilities in a public setting had I known that."

"You've told us that already!" Root snapped. "Where is it? We know it's not on you, so where is it?"

Artemis took a second to think and shivered, despite the heat pressing down on him. "Jon Spiro was the last person to have it. If - if you're right about - about London, then you'd probably find it on - on his body, if it hasn't been destroyed completely." Spiro was most likely dead. On that note, so was Arno Blunt. Artemis didn't know how to feel about the fact that it was by his own hand.

Root scowled. "Great."

"I can track it." Artemis blurted. "There's a program on my phone." Artemis began patting his chest, praying that it had not been destroyed in all the chaos. It had not; the innocuous black case Artemis had personally designed had protected the marvelous piece of technology from the extreme temperatures. Artemis quickly unlocked the phone and pulled up the C-Cube's tracker. Even underground, by piggybacking off of Foaly's own signals, the phone quickly connected with the satellites and began pinpointing the C-Cube's location. The signal was weak, but eventually the phone indicated an address a couple of blocks away from the restaurant where everything had happened.

So Spiro was dead.

Shaking away the thought, Artemis screen-shot the GPS coordinates and emailed it to Foaly.

"There." Artemis breathed. "I sent the coordinates to Foaly."

The sudden unfocusing of Root's eyes as he stared at something in his helmet that Artemis could not see suggested that Root already knew that. The commander began barking out orders to a person Artemis could not hear (most likely Foaly), stopping several times to scowl and change them, then growl and change them again, muttering something about a "stupid centaur distracted by who-knows-what".

While Root was putting together a group of fairies to retrieve the technology, Artemis could feel Holly's eyes on him. He turned his head to meet her eyes. She was examining him with a critical gaze, and Artemis was hyper-aware of the sweat dripping down his forehead and neck, the slouch of his back, and the swaying of his body.

"Are you feeling alright?" The elf asked bluntly. "We turned the heat on."

"I noticed," Artemis commented dryly. "I shall be fine." Well, that wasn't quite true, but what was he supposed to say? _Actually, no, I'm feeling quite terrible, and while I doubt it would kill me, I've never tested it. Would you mind turning the heat done so I can regain my health and potentially destroy all of Haven with my out of control powers?_ Yeah, that would go over well.

"If you need it turned down, we can do that. We just wanted to make sure we could hold back the ice long enough to talk to you."

"'Hold the ice back'?" Artemis frowned at the phrasing. 'Hold it back'? Containment, not eradication?

"Well, yeah. You said it melts at a rate natural to the temperature around, and that you didn't really like the heat, so we thought that turning up the heat would at least slow down the process long enough to ask about the C-Cube and get out." Holly narrowed her eyes at the Mud Boy. "When we leave, we can lower the temperature."

Artemis looked at her oddly, and Holly couldn't tell what he was thinking (not that that was anything new).

"Why would you do that?" He finally said.

"Why?" Holly echoed. "So you aren't broiled alive. You look awful, Mud Boy." She wasn't lying. Artemis's face was flushed, and she could see sweat pouring off his forehead. The tattered suit he wore was damp and rumpled, and clung to him unnaturally. She could see him sway where he sat, and she wouldn't be surprised if he collapsed back against the bed. He looked ill.

Artemis just continued to stare. "Why?" He asked again, as if her answer wasn't a real answer. "Why do you care? Why would you want me alive now? You have what you came for. As of now, I'm nothing more than a liability, so why would I not expect you to simply shoot me?"

. . . _What?_ Holly opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Did - did Artemis just -

"You think we're going to kill you?" She finally found her voice.

Artemis simply gave her a flat look. "If you are done with the C-Cube, there is no reason for me to still be living. Alive, I am nothing but a problem. Dead, you are assured that nothing like London will happen again, to either Haven or another human city."

The fact that that made sense sent chills down Holly's spine. She hadn't thought of that, hadn't even considered the option of simply killing Fowl, but she knew the Council well enough to know that someone or multiple someones would come up with the idea and push to make it happen.

"Except we don't kill people, Fowl." Root had finally finished his conversation with Foaly and was now directing his eyes to the human.

"A bio-bomb launched at my home says otherwise." Artemis retorted.

"You purposefully instigated that plan of attack, and that game is over now. You haven't drawn us into a game since, so we can't and won't touch you." Root ground out. "Believe or not, Mud Boy, but the People don't immediately leap to killing as the be-all, end-all tactic."

Artemis didn't seem impressed by Root's defense of his species. "I would bet gold that your government is willing to say that my powers count as magic, and therefore makes me a magical being that the People as a whole has custody over. I'm sure that you have executed trolls in the past that became far too deadly to the general public."

Holly couldn't help but shiver. Artemis was right. She could vividly remember the Troll Massacres of 1236 she had learned about in school, when several trolls formed an especially vicious pack and terrorized the outskirts of Haven for weeks. After several gruesome failures to subdue them, the Council had finally authorized lethal measures, and the LEPRecon and LEPRetrieval teams of the day found the pack's lair and killed every last one. How much easier would it be to successfully argue for the execution of Artemis Fowl, a human now more dangerous than ever before in the eyes of the People?

Artemis nodded. "I will not pretend that my head is not on the chopping block. You may not have plans now, but how long will it take for someone to wonder why you are harboring the monster responsible for the destruction of London in the _very breakable_ city of Haven?"

"We're not in Haven." Neither Holly nor Artemis missed the way Root dodged the real question. "You're about 50 klicks away. You really think that we would set up a bomb-testing facility so close to the general population? Back in Russia, you used up your power and were fine for the rest of the journey. I thought you could do the same here."

Artemis's expression twisted. "That was a year ago."

"So?"

" _So_ , my powers have been growing exponentially stronger ever since. Did you miss the difference between freezing a train car and freezing downtown London? I have limits, of course, but I have no idea what those are. You also may have noticed that it did not take long for me to regain even a fraction of those powers. I would even hazard to guess that I never even depleted them, and it was only your drugs that kept me from immediately freezing Captain Short."

Artemis was gripping the sides of the raised cot, sweat rolling down his face and plastering his hair to his skin. His eyes were hard as he glared at the two fairies. "I don't know what my powers will do if you turn the heat off. I don't know if this -" he waved a hand, and nearly toppled over doing so, "will be enough. Alive, I'm _not safe_."

" . . . You're certainly doing your best to convince us of that." Holly finally said, words prompted by a feeling creeping over her. Something wasn't right here, with _Artemis._ Something more than grief.

His eyes flashed towards her. "What?"

Holly spoke slowly, pondering over each word even as she spoke them. "This is the most coherent and rational you've been all day, and the only thing you've talked about is how we are going to kill you. How we _should_ kill you."

Artemis didn't respond. His jaw tensed minutely, and he looked slightly away from Holly's eyes.

"Captain Short -" Root began to say.

Holly stepped closer to Artemis. He flinched back, but said nothing as she stood in front of him.

"You want us to kill you." Her voice was low. "This entire time, you've been emphasizing that the Council is going to kill you, and you haven't given one reason as to why we shouldn't, haven't tried to play any kind of tricks. That's not like you, Fowl. You _want_ us to kill you."

Her hands were trembling. Why were they trembling?

"I _expect_ to be killed." Artemis corrected, still not looking at her. "Why wouldn't I be? Isn't that what they do to murderers? To monsters?"

"You're not a murderer. You -"

"Do not - lie to me." Artemis panted, body shivering. "I got Butler _killed_ , and in my temper I killed who knows how many more innocent people. I killed innocent men and women and _children_ because I was _upset_. If that doesn't make a murderer, _Captain_ , then what would?" Finally he met her eyes again, daring her to argue.

Her hands were still shaking. She curled her hands into fists to stop them. "It was an accident. You said it yourself that you didn't mean it."

"That doesn't make it better!" Artemis snapped, his shaky composure finally breaking as he launched from the hospital cot. He landed unsteadily on his feet and was forced to grip the side of the bed to keep himself upright, his legs shaking underneath his weight. "It doesn't matter what my intentions were; I killed them! I was selfish and petty and thousands have suffered because of it. I am a murderer, Holly Short, a monster! Why should I be allowed to live?"

He took another wobbly step forward. Holly was now close enough to feel the unhealthy heat radiating from Artemis' body, and she wondered how he could find the strength to stand while looking so ill.

"Easy there, Fowl." Root had hung back so far in their conversation, but now he stepped forward. "You don't look too good."

Artemis stiffened. "I ask again, why do you care? If it is out of some sense of moral duty, I can assure you, chaining the monster is the correct course of action. The heat will most likely not kill me."

"Most likely?" Root pounced on the words. "You don't know?"

"I sincerely doubt that it would." Artemis rephrased. "It is not something I have cared to test extensively." But still, he backtracked, grip returning to the bed frame. His legs felt like jello, and he was unsure of how much longer he could remain standing.

He looked back at Holly, who was shaking slightly, and he felt another small rush of guilt for his outburst. Could he do nothing right today?

"I apologize, Holly. I should not have shouted at you like that." He slid himself back onto the bed, unable to stand much longer. His head was aching, and it was getting harder and harder to concentrate. Despite spending more time in the last 12 hours unconscious than aware, he was exhausted and desperate for this day, for this nightmare, to be over, in one way or another.

"But you believe the things you said?" Holly's head was bowed, her eyes hooded.

Artemis swallowed. "I believe that the People will wish for me to be executed. I believe that that may be the correct choice. It would be better for everyone." How could he not think that? How could he justify sparing his life? There was nothing that could possibly be done to fix this, to return those lives that he had stolen. This may not even be the end of the destruction. If he ever lost control again, the body count could very well become astronomical before anyone could stop him. Why on earth would he protest the execution of a monster?

. . . Did he want to die?

. . . Not particularly. But he also did not particularly wish to live at this point either, and he was certain many others no doubt shared the same opinion. All he wanted right now was for this to be over.

Holly's hands were clenching and unclenching. "So that's it? You're not going to try to fight back? Just roll over and accept it and let yourself be killed?"

"Short -" Root began warningly, but like she always did, Holly plowed forward.

"You're just going to give up? Not even try to make amends? Since when did the great boy genius Artemis Fowl the Second back down?"

"What could make up for what I've done? Tell me. Holly. How could I fix this? I am a genius and a freak, not a god." Artemis scoffed bitterly. This was not a problem that could be swept under the rug or fixed with a quickly written check. This was the weight of thousands of lives on his soul. How could he be expected to carry that?

He was a monster, and monsters were slain. That's how the world worked.

"You D'Arviting cowpog!" Holly swore in Gnommish, shaking with what Artemis now guessed to be anger. "I'm not asking you to resurrect the dead. You say you're a threat alive, but you're no use to anyone dead! You let yourself die now, and the only thing you've done is kill. How would your death fix that?"

"I wouldn't be hurting anyone else." Artemis said shakily.

"Do you really think that's true?" Holly glared. "What about your parents? Are you just gonna let them needlessly grieve for you?"

Artemis startled. His parents . . . he had almost forgotten about them. Surely they knew about London by now; they must be worried sick trying to find him, trying to figure out what had happened. They had only recently been reunited as a family. How would his parents take it if, merely months after they became whole again, he tore himself away from them?

No. No, they would understand. What had his father asked of him just weeks before? ' _Will you make the journey with me? When the moment comes, will you take your chance to be a hero?'_ This was his chance; heroes slayed monsters, and this was his chance to kill the monster. Father, at least, would understand, wouldn't he?

But Mother . . . her health had become so fragile when Father had disappeared. Would it deteriorate the same way upon his passing?

_She will be fine_ , he brusquely told himself. She would have Father, and Father would be able to get her proper medical help without fear of Child Services breathing down his neck. Mother would be fine, Father would be fine, _they would be fine_ . . . wouldn't they?

As if sensing his sudden hesitance, Holly pressed her advantage, stepping forward, almost managing to loom over his slumped form. "And what about Juliet? She deserves to know what happened to her brother, doesn't she? Or are you just going to let her sit and wonder what happened to him?"

A shiver. Juliet. She was currently in the middle of who-knows-where, training with Butler's Sensei, Madame Ko, but eventually she would hear about London. She would connect the dots to him, and immediately jet back to Fowl Manor to find . . . no one. Not Butler, not him, not even his parents. She would be left without answers until his parents made contact - and who knew when that might be - and informed her that Butler hadn't been seen since London. That he had vanished right alongside Artemis, and was mostly in the same shape. Dead.

But there would always be that nagging at Juliet, just like there had been with him. That he was not dead, that he _couldn't_ be dead. She would not believe it until she had a body, and that may not happen for years, may not ever happen. Juliet would suffer the same way he had when he waited for his father. He . . . He couldn't do that to Juliet. He owed her that much.

"I could -"

But Holly wasn't going to let him talk.

"And speaking of Butler, are you just going to dishonor him like that?" Holly growled. Artemis flinched. _What - ?_

"He gave his life so that you could live, you said that yourself, and you're going to waste that by letting yourself be killed not even 24 hours later? Without so much as even giving him a proper burial before you spit on his sacrifice?" She grabbed his shoulder tightly. "What kind of - !"

"Short!" Root snatched her arm and yanked her away from Fowl. "That's enough! Stand down!" The Mud Boy was pale and shaking even harder than before, very at odds with the sweat staining his clothes and skin and the curve of his back. Root probably should have cut the Captain off sooner, he knew her past, but he had thought that she might be able to knock some sense into the human. She may have, too. But the way she went at it, he could tell she had gone too far.

"Holly, go wait in the observation chamber."

"But Commander -!"

"NOW, SHORT! That's an order!" Root roared.

Short scowled at him, but turned and went to the steel-incased room. Root resisted the urge to sigh and put his head in his hands. He was going to have to have a word with her soon. He went back to Fowl, who seemed to have slightly regained the composure he had lost at Holly's outburst.

"We have Butler's body." Surprise flared in the human's eyes. "We retrieved it right after we got you. We can make . . . arrangements, if you want. If there's anything specific you have in mind, Foaly _might_ be able to make it happen. _If_ you cooperate."

Fowl nodded, not quite looking him in the eyes. "I understand, Commander. Thank you." For once, Root was certain the boy was actually sincere.

"As for what happens next," Root did sigh this time, "as of now, there is no proposal to have you killed yet. I guarantee there will be at least one who will objects when it comes up, though," he could think of a couple, actually, "and the Council needs a unanimous agreement to carry out an execution. So don't expect to be throwing yourself at the gallows anytime soon."

Fowl didn't say a word, just continued to nod his understanding. "I upset Captain Short, didn't I." He said matter-of-factly, taking any hint of a question out of his words.

"It's not my place to say." He didn't particularly want to discuss it with anyone, much less the Mud Boy that was flipping back and forth between threat and victim so fast it made Root's head ache. Frond, he wanted a cigar. "Let's leave it at she's had some bad experiences with people sacrificing themselves for what they think is the greater good."

Curiosity flicked across Fowl's face, but he did not pursue it. "Alright. I suppose I can understand that. Give her my apologies."

Root nodded sharply. "Get some rest. You look like death warmed over." And with that, Root took his leave.

Holly was waiting in the observation room just as he had asked, leaning her back against one of the walls. At the hiss of the door, she stood at attention, ramrod straight. She didn't wait for Root to say anything.

"I'm sorry, sir. I overstepped my boundaries."

Root gestured for her to walk with him as they made their way to the cavern entrance, where their shuttle waited. "Is that so, Short?"

"Yes, sir. I shouldn't have grabbed or yelled at Fowl. I knew he would feel guilty. I knew he probably wouldn't be at his most mentally stable. Hearing him trying to rag us into killing him, though, I couldn't help but shout at him."

"Hmm." Root rumbled non-committedly. "He reminded you of your father, didn't he?"

Holly flushed. "Yes, sir." She mumbled. "He had that same look on his face when he turned down the cure. Claimed he was already too far gone for it to work, that it would be better to pass it on to someone who needed it more, someone who had people who needed them." The younger elf's fingers curled to fists. "He was lying. He would have lived if he had gotten that cure. He didn't care about helping someone else, he just didn't want to keep living without my mother when there was such an easy way out right there in front of him. He didn't even think that I -!"

She cut herself off, cheeks growing red with embarrassment. "Sorry, sir. You already know all this."

Root brushed off the apology. "You know Fowl's situation is different."

"I do." Holly said shortly.

Root waited.

" . . . I didn't like him before all this, sir, and I don't know if I do now. I do know, though, that I feel sorry for him." Holly said honestly. "I don't think he deserves to die, especially when he has people waiting for him on the surface."

"Then what do you think should be done with him?" Root asked, genuinely curious of what her answer would be. He had been tossing around the same question himself for the last few hours, and had come up with only a handful of answers, none of which he was sure of getting through the Council.

Holly mulled it over. ". . . I think he needs training. It may not be magic that he can do, but maybe the warlocks can at least teach him how to better manage the power. I mean, it's probably a miracle that he managed to keep from doing this before now. All that raw power ready to be released at the first hint of anger or grief? It's a wonder he hasn't frozen half of Ireland by now."

"That's going to be a hard sell." Root mused, inwardly turning over the implications of being able to put a harness on Fowl and, at the same time, gain a favor with the devious Mud Boy.

"Well, it's that or really killing him. Sir." Holly huffed. "We can't just let him go like this, especially if Fowl is right about his powers getting stronger and stronger. If we don't do something, the next time he goes off we might not be able to stop him." She shivered slightly. "It was bad enough trying to get through that blizzard now; if he gets much stronger, we might not be able to navigate it at all."

"He's really that powerful?" The question was rhetorical. He had seen what Fowl could do if he was trying in the Artic, and he had seen the footage of what Fowl could do if he let everything out all at once. He was powerful, frighteningly so, and suddenly Root wasn't so certain that an order to execute would be as difficult to pass as he had thought earlier.

"Well then, we'd better get working on your proposal. Gather our allies on the Council and convince them that training Fowl is our best option. You know," Root mused, "I bet if we let the eggheads under Foaly and the warlocks poke at him, we could get their backing. This is like nothing I've ever read about in the Book. They'll be dying to figure out what makes Fowl tick." Now that he thought about it, Section 8 would probably love to study the Mud Boy, and with their pull . . . Yes, it would be smart to contact Wing Commander Vinyaya. With a little work, she could probably get the Mud Boy classified under Section 8 jurisdiction.

"You think Fowl would agree to that?" Holly asked skeptically as they approached the shuttle.

Root clambered up the shuttle stairs. "He may not have a choice."

* * *

Foaly was waiting for them at Police Plaza. Never a good sign; Foaly rarely left the safety of his Ops Booth.

"What's the situation, Foaly?" Root immediately barked.

Foaly dodged the question, waving for them to follow him as he walked down the hall. "Trust me, you'll have to see it to believe it."

"What happened?" Holly asked as she picked up her pace to keep up with the centaur's long strides.

"I was going through the security camera footage, trying to see if the camera had caught anything more of the snowstorm, when a thought occurred to me. Artemis was found leaning over Butler, and Butler was completely frozen solid."

"Your point, Foaly?" Root huffed as Foaly led them down a stairwell into the basement.

"I wondered if that meant that Butler was the first thing in the room to be frozen, if Butler had instantly been frozen. If that was true, then I thought there might be a chance that . . ." Foaly trailed off as he started checking the room numbers.

"Chance that what?"

"There was nothing to lose, so I called in some of the warlocks and - well, see for yourselves." Foaly stopped in front of a door and quickly punched in a code.

The door slid open to reveal what was clearly originally meant to be a storage room. Shelves filled with odds and ends of old police and recon equipment lined the walls. More junk had been shoved into the corners of the room to clear a large open space for what seemed to be a makeshift mattress on the floor, made from pillows, shock blankets, and whatever other soft fabric that could be found in the building. An IV, heart monitor, and other medical monitoring equipment was placed next to the pile of fabric, and a slight pixie in a medical uniform was perched on one of the storage containers, making notes on her clipboard.

Lying on the quickly constructed mattress was the very much unfrozen body of Butler. A body that, according to the heart monitor, had a pulse.

"There wasn't a bed or cri-med room big enough for him." Foaly needlessly commented.

Holly couldn't believe her eyes. She blinked several times, convinced that she was seeing something wrong. "But that's - that's not possible. He's dead! He was shot, and frozen solid! How can he be alive?!"

"It was because he was frozen," the pixie in the corner slid back down to the floor and walked up to the three, "that he was able to live, Captain Short. Chief Warlock Dia Antimony, at your service." She shook hands Holly and Root.

"I would appreciate it if you could answer Captain Short's question. How in the name of Frond is he alive?" Root looked like he had a migraine coming on. Holly didn't blame him. How many more times would a bombshell be dropped on them today? First Artemis's ice powers, then Butler's death, then Artemis's mental breakdowns, now Butler was alive again? Holly's head hurt just thinking about it.

"Ah, you see, right before your Mud Man was frozen, he was only clinically dead. Clinical death and _death-_ death, called brain death, are two very different things. During clinical death, the patients major bodily functions, such as their breathing and heartbeat, cease, but their brains are still active to some extent. The clinically dead are only mostly dead - which means they are slightly alive." Antimony smiled slightly.

"Now, normally clinical death is followed by brain death within minutes. Brain cells don't last very long after the body stops working, and the rest of the organs will usually give out shortly after. However, when the temperature of cells is lowered sufficiently, the metabolisms of the cells slows down, giving the cells more time before they die, like how food takes longer to go bad if it's frozen. It's pretty much the same situation here. If he hadn't been frozen immediately after clinical death, then yes, the Mud Man would very much be dead, but his body was almost perfectly preserved. We'll have to wait until he wakes up to be certain, but I'd say it's likely he took little to no brain damage."

She smiled disarmingly at Root. "And I am very curious to know where exactly you got a frozen Mud Man and why my team worked so hard to revive him."

Root was not amused. "Well, keep wondering."

"Let me rephrase." Her smile vanished. "I want to know why my team worked hard to revive Butler, a known associate of Artemis Fowl, and widely considered a threat to the safety of the People."

Holly blinked. "You know who he is?"

"I was a medic on the scene of the Fowl Manor siege, Captain Short." Antimony explained. "You didn't need my assistance, so I hung back. But I've done my research. I know who this is," her green eyes flickered to the unconscious bodyguard, "and I want to know how he got in this situation and why the People are aiding him."

Root let out a low puff of air that could have been a sigh or a growl. "I wasn't aware he was in need of aid until a few moments ago." He turned on Foaly. "Why didn't you pass this through me first?"

"Time was of the essence, Commander. Even frozen, those brain cells won't last forever. It had already been hours since Butler went under. Honestly, I'm surprised it actually worked." Foaly defended.

Root clenched and unclenched his fists, let out something that was definitely a growl, then turned back to Warlock Antimony. "This wasn't how I planned on contacting your faction, but I was going to talk to the warlocks on something top secret within the hour anyway. You said you're Chief Warlock? High enough up the food chain to make decisions, or at least have the ear of whoever's in charge?"

"You're looking at the big fish in the pond." From Antimony's grin, that fish was a shark.

"Does he need medical supervision, or will anyone watching him do?"

"Anyone will do until the next round of IV drips in a couple hours." Antimony confirmed. "He'll most likely be out for a few days anyway, so there's not much to watch."

"Short, sit with Butler, make sure he stays alive. Foaly, go back to the Ops booth and do your actual job. Keep an eye on Fowl and the Mud Men topside. Warlock Antimony, if you would come with me to somewhere more appropriate? We have a lot to discuss."

Root and Antimony exited, quickly followed out by Foaly. Holly climbed on top of the storage container that Antimony had recently been occupying. She resisted the urge to reach out and touch Butler. She knew he was real; in the quiet, she could hear him breathing. It was surreal, though. She had just come to terms with the fact that Butler was dead. 50 kilometers away, Artemis was grieving over him. But here the Mud Man was, alive and, well, not kicking, but in far better shape than he had been hours before.

_Artemis_. When he heard the news . . . this could be a game-changer.

Settling into a comfortable position, Holly began to keep her watch over Butler.

* * *

"A Mud Man with the power to create ice and snow from nothing?" Antimony frowned skeptically from where she sat in the chair across from Root's desk. "Commander, is there a polite way to ask if you think I'm a gullible idiot?"

"We have proof; all of London is proof, actually." Root flipped the monitor to face the warlock. The human news site CNN was showing live footage of the rescue efforts being carried out. In the bottom corner, recaps of captured footage of the storm played.

The warlock cocked her head. That wasn't exactly proof that Fowl had anything to do with it.

"We also have video of his brief containment here in the Plaza." Root typed in a few commands and brought up the file. On-screen, Antimony could see Fowl and Captain Short talking in a hospital room. Fowl seemed to be agitated, shaking visibly and nervously nursing a glass of water. Then -

_Kssh!_ The glass in Fowl's hands exploded into shards of ice and powdered snow. Antimony's eyes widened as she watch Fowl proceed to freeze and break the chain to his bed and scramble away from Captain Short, covering the bed and filling the air with snow as he did so.

"Thought that would get your attention." Root said gruffly, shutting the computer off.

"Alright," Antimony began, her voice betraying none of the curiosity and excitement that was beginning to well up inside her, "let's say that this isn't a hoax and I believe you. What do you want from me?"

"Nothing but your support. You've seen what Fowl can do; the People are not going to want to just let him go, especially when he knows about our existence. As he stands right now, he's a threat to every living thing on this planet."

"So, what? You want me to argue to mind-wipe him?" Because she could already tell the Commander that that was not going to happen.

"No. It is my opinion, and Captain Short's, that more than anything, Fowl needs to be taught control. Mind-wiping him won't stop the possibility of something like this happening again. London was a result of Fowl losing control of his powers when Butler was . . . wounded. As far as I can see, there are only two options. We either make sure he learns to control his powers, or we kill him."

"Absolutely not." Antimony protested. "That goes against every rule in the Book. He hasn't engaged with us specifically; as far as the Book is concerned, we have no right to harm him."

"Fowl himself made the argument that with his abilities, the Council could classify him as a magical creature, putting him in our jurisdiction." Root chomped at the end of a (thankfully) unlit cigar. "I can't say I don't see that happening."

"That's ridiculous. Powers or not, he's human."

Root nodded. "Despite my past with the Mud Boy, I don't want him dead. We're not killers. I'd like to know if you'd be willing to support a proposal to keep Fowl under observation and teach him how to control himself."

Antimony leaned forward in her chair. "That's a bold proposal. It'll probably be more difficult to pass than an execution order."

"Is that a no?"

"Of course not. What kind of medical professional would I be if I condoned such an act? What I want to know is if you have a plan, because you're going to need one to win over the Council. You said it yourself; Fowl is a security threat. To teach him, I'm going to need constant access to him, and that means a lot of time spent here in Haven."

Root gave her a stare. "Who said anything about _you_ teaching him?"

"That's what you wanted to speak with the warlocks about, right? Getting one of us to teach him? I won't pretend that I'm not extremely curious about how exactly his powers work. They certainly aren't like any magic I've studied before; this kind of ability is straight out of elfling tales. If I teach him, I get to study him. As a scientist, it's a dream come true."

It would be an absolute waste, in Antimony's opinion, to kill Fowl. Not only a waste of precious life, but a horrible way to treat one of the greatest magical mysteries since Frond himself. If there was one thing Antimony loved, it was mysteries. She could vividly remember hours pouring over every single mystery novel she could find on the Ethernet, and days in school completely dedicated to researching magical anomalies for her thesis papers. This was her chance to finally meet one of those mysteries herself, to have her shot at unraveling the truth. The thought was almost too good to be true.

She had no love for humans, and she couldn't claim any sentiment to Fowl. However, she would never agree to killing a sentient being. She would not let the Mud Boy be executed, not when there was so much he could offer to the world. Not when there was so much to learn from him.

"I was counting on that." Root admitted. "As for a plan, I have a few ideas. Do you want to go over them?"

Antimony smiled. "I would like that very much."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So . . . a few things.
> 
> 1) Artemis. I hope I didn't make him so completely out of character. The Artemis I'm writing in this version is far more emotional than canon!Artemis anyway, and I figured under so many different negative influences (the guilt of Butler and London, the constant drugging, the heat making him sick), he would not be doing very well mentally, and that would take him to some logical extremes. I don't think he would want to do, but he's exhausted and would think it might be for the greater good to stop himself before something else happens.
> 
> 2) Holly's father. I couldn't find any cause of death, just that it was about 20 years before, and I think the timing would probably work out for him to have died in the Spelltropy epidemic that happened a few years after Holly's mother died. 
> 
> 3) The science. So after doing extensive research (Read: rewatching MatPat's Frankenstein/resurrecting the dead video), I figured that it should be scientifically possible for Butler to be revived . . . if the time line had been a bit shorter. But Colfer was pushing with his own timeline, and this is freaking magic, so I feel justified. I also tried to science Artemis not feeling well in the heat, but please remember I take mainly Bio classes, and have not studied heat transfer since middle school, so I could be wrong.
> 
> 4) My OC. She may or may not become important, so what do you guys think? We don't really know many fairy doctors (Argon and the other guy (Columbus?) are psychiatrists, which are fairly different), so I made a warlock character, as they would be qualified to monitor Artemis' powers and teach him tricks on how to control it. So what do you think?
> 
> Okay, moving on from the paragraphs of author's notes, what do you think in general? Too angsty? Too OOC? A character you wanted to see not get enough screentime? This chapter definitely could have been better, in my opinion. Comment, rant, like, flame in the box below, and I'll see you next time!


End file.
